Trying to solve problems like Maria

Will this become a regular feature? I don’t know! I have a lot of things that I write and assume they will become regular features on this blog and they sure never do! Lazy! We all know how much I love coming up with punny sitcom titles for hypothetical shows but sometimes the puns don’t flow in threes and fours so here’s one I thought of the other day.

Whine and Spirits – When everyone’s favorite The Nanny, Fran Drescher, buys a house on coastal Long Island everything seems peachy – except to the GHOSTS that have been inhabiting the house! Where’s Mr. Sheffield when you need him? Nasal-twinged scariness ensues! Only on the We Network.

This reminds me of the time that Previous Boyfriend’s mom was in town and we met her for dinner on the Upper West Side and Niles the Butler was having a drink at the bar of the restaurant. She approached him and said “I miss The Nanny!”, to which he deadpanned “I miss the paychecks.” So dry, the humor! I don’t even think he’s English. If you’ve never heard that story before, it’s because I rarely get the opportunity to work anything relating to The Nanny into conversation. Curiously enough.

The past few weeks have been full of Only In New York-style stories – JonFoss told a story about a rat running up a pant leg, Kate saw a man smoking a cigar while throwing up on the sidewalk, only to later notice he had thrown up at regular intervals all the way down the block. But last night I finally had my moment too. A man peed in my subway car. Not between trains, not over the subway platform, but between 50th and 59th street stations on the 1 train, while sitting in his seat, he unzipped and peed right there on the floor. He did not look homeless either (although who knows, homeless people have cell phones these days so anything is possible).

I was on my way to see DeVotchKa at Terminal 5 which I was reviewing, of course. Only for New York.

What if the island on Lost was a real place? What if the crash survivors we never hear from are a hilarious bunch who band together to create a clever phony newspaper, Onion-style? I know, I wondered too! Here are some sample headlines from the The Lost Onion:

I was just looking online at Old Navy clothes (yoga pants in particular) because they are cheap and relatively cute – I would rather buy $15 Old Navy pants than $85 Lululemon pants because no matter what the brand, I’m still going to end up wearing them as pajamas in 6 months so…really, why bother? Also, even though I revel in buying adorable dresses for summer, I pretty much identify as an “urbane tomboy“, The Observer’s moniker for chicks who live in sweatshirt material. Sorry, mom. I really do like dressing up but not every day. Which is why I own 3 pairs of Birkenstocks, 2 pairs of All-Stars and one pair of Frye Boots that see the light of day 90% of the time and about 10 pairs of platforms, heels and wedges that are the flowers in the attic of my shoes. (V.C. And-shoes!)

A halter- hoodie vest! Who? What? Why? It defies logic and taste! Would you ever wear the hood up, thus revealing an open back? And what if you completely unzip? Will you have two wings flapping in the wind? I appreciate creative, original design, especially creative design that makes use of fleece and pockets but I’m befuddled, Old Navy. This Performance Fleece is pitchy, dawg.

I kinda get the feeling more and more than I am in every way a 14-year-old. Mostly this is because every show I go to these days has an equal number of adults and 14-year-olds in attendance – where are the parents? And how do these kids know about music? I was only into Boyz II Men and Bohemian Rhapsody at 14, definitely not seeking out “indie” or “under the radar” bands. (Although the Boston Globe ran a list every week, maybe they still do, of the music charts including a foreign-sounding “College Rock” list that always featured stuff like The Stone Roses and The Cure which was over my head and sounded scary. Cure for what??! Oh God!) But anyway, I do feel like an old maid when I go to shows like Rilo Kiley and last night’s Tegan and Sara show – not that there were THAT many kids there (although some great parents brought a two-year-old…I just don’t get people [again, see “old maid” comment]) but I mean, seriously, when you were fourteen would your parents let you come to 56th street and 11th Ave.? It’s dangerous over there, what with all the BMW dealerships and all.

The review is online today and if you haven’t listened to The Con, you should, it’s excellent. High school sophomores everywhere would agree.

A week and a half ago, New York Magazine dispatched dozens of roving reporters into our city to cover loads of music shows, from Staten Island to the Bronx. I was one of them and I didn’t even have to leave my neighborhood. The feature runs in the week’s magazine, here’s a link. I attended the Hungry March Band show at a block party in Fort Greene and watched babies eat corn on a stick.

Photo montage taken from New York Magazine. Habana Outpost picture taken at 2:32pm by me.

As much as I love getting on the trendy food bandwagon (truffles! cupcakes! macaroni-and-cheese-only restaurants!), I really don’t like Pinkberry. Love the idea, love the name, love the overly design-y decor, hate the taste. Sorry, friends! I put sweeteners, fruit and granola on my Fage (Fay-eh!) to mask it’s sour taste while getting all of it’s creamy texture, but I wouldn’t whip it with air and freeze it and do other unspecified and not necessarily natural things to it and buy it for $6 a serving.

Which is why I love Yogurtland (I especially love Yogurtland’s name! I’ve been magically whisked away to…Yogurtland! I won an all expense paid trip to…Yogurtland! You get the point, there is pun-potential here.) Glennis and I went yesterday on Kate’s recommendation and I fell in love with this live, active, cultural phenomenon for the following reasons:

A) You choose how much or little yogurt you want, AND as much or little (many or few?) toppings. When have you ever gotten to do that (unless you were me in high school and worked at a TCBY where you would eat cups and cups of yogurt with cups and cups of sugar-free hot fudge on top because you probably had some food issues that should have been addressed)?

A, part 2) Conventional sizing structures need not apply! If you want kid-sized cup, you can take an ounce or two and that’s okay, you don’t have to say “One child size cup please!” and make people think you are watching your girlish figure or wonder if you have a child waiting outside on a leash. If you are especially sad on a particular day, you can squeeze yourself out a quart, no one will judge you for saying “One quart made up of six flavors to go, please” and assume you were recently dumped while losing your job and being burgled all in one day.

B) You can get any combination of any number of flavors! Taro plus cheesecake plus cookies and cream? Sign me up.

C) It’s like…30 cents? or 39 cents? an ounce. I had about 7 ounces and 2 toppings and it was like $3.59. It’s cheaper than Pinkberry and a lot more fun! That’s a ratio I can live with.

D) See above re: Yogurtland: The Name! Don’t Yogurtland So Close to Me! The Leader of Yogurtland is tired and his eyes are growing old…

Everyone’s talking about it! I feel like this concept has been a long time coming, like how everyone always kind of had an idea that there had to be a way to invent Tivo and Youtube and auto-correcting spelling features in Word, this is exactly what frozen yogurt parlors (?) should have been all along.